


All's fair in snow and war

by necle



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou | Natsume's Book of Friends
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Light-Hearted, Natsume Yuujinchou Secret Santa 2018, References to Past Bullying, Snowball Fight, and maybe a little bit cheesy, but otherwise fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 17:50:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17248721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/necle/pseuds/necle
Summary: There is snow outside so Nishimura and Kitamoto teach Natsume how to make snowballs. Snowball fight ensues.For @metal-dragons as part of the Natsume Yuujinchou 2018 Secret Santa. Happy Holidays!





	All's fair in snow and war

“Wow! The snow is just perfect!" Nishimura exclaimed, taking a scoop of snow in his glove-clad hands. He raised it up high, as if admiring it's sparkling, white beauty. After a beat, he then suddenly clamped his other hand on top of the pile of snow, mischievously smiling as he cupped both ends tightly.

"Perfect for snowballs that is!" he exclaimed, more impressed than before with his new spherical creation. "Man, me and Kitamoto used to do this all the time," Nishimura added before turning to his friend, "Hey, Natsume. Have you ever been a snowball fight?" 

The blond kid in question looked up in thought before replying, "Sorta of. With my cat though"

Said cat was snoozing on a tall tree branch nearby.

"Here, we'll give you some tips." Kitamoto started before he scooped a similar handful as his friend. "Make sure that you make your snowballs as round as possible,” Kitamoto suggested before providing a demonstration. In his hands, he cupped a snowball. "Then you stalk your target. The best way to catch your opponents by sur-" 

TWAMP! A cold snowball splatted centre of Kitamoto's exposed cheek, causing him to stumble a bit.

“Hey! What was that for?” Kitamoto yelled at his friend. But Nishimura was on the ground laughing.

"Here's another important tip, Natsume,” Nishimura said between laughs, “Anything can happen.”

Natsume also joined in with Nishimura's laughter. It was always amusing to see his friends in such childish antics. He soon realized that his laughter was the only noise in the air. Feeling uncomfortable, Natsume opened his eyes to see his friends slowly closing in on him. With devilish smirks on their faces, in their palms were two, well-rounded snowballs.

"Hey, guys? What exactly are you doing?" Natsume asked, laughing nervously before taking a step back.

"Hey, it's best to learn these things through first-hand experience," Kitamoto explained with a huge grin on his face.

"But, come on. It's two against one. That's hardly fair," Natsume half-heartily protested as he took another step back. Unfortunately, that step ended with his back against a large tree.

Nishimura snickered at the blond boy's helplessness before reminding him, "Like we said, Natsume. Anything can happen!" 

With that, both Nishimura and Kitamoto arched their arm with the snowballs in hand.

Just as they were going to hurl the snowballs, the branch right above them shook. The snow that rested at the edge of the branches came falling onto the unsuspecting duo. After the two got buried in snow, a figure jumped down from the tree.

"Tanuma?" Natsume asked, looking relieved to see his friend here.

"Thought I'd even out the playing field,” Tanuma commented.

"Thanks, Tanuma." Natsume replied gratefully before they gave each other fist bumps.

Kitamoto comically popped out of the snow pile, letting out a shiver before complaining, "D-Damn it, Tanuma. You could have been a little more easy off the snow"

"Sorry," Tanuma sheepishly apologized before adding, "Guess what you said was true, huh.”  
When Kitamoto raised an eyebrow disbelievingly, Tanuma just shrugged, “Anything can happen.”

Nishimura then comically popped his head up from the snow pile as well and declared, "That's it! Team Boke And Tsukkomi declares war on Team Needs To Eat More Meat" 

A frown crossed Kitamoto's features. "Can we change our team’s name first?" Kitamoto asked.

And with that, each team went on opposite sides to build their respective forts.

Natsume and Tanuma decided to build their forts in front of the tree that Natsume bumped into earlier while Kitamoto and Nishimura took several feet away from it.

“So, what’s the plan?” Tanuma whispered.

“I don’t know. I’ve never done this before,” Natsume answered.

“Same,” Tanuma said as he scoped up the area. 

“Well, we need a strong, tall fort, right? We can use this tree as the backside for support and build our fort around it,” Natsume suggested, starting to pad the snow upwards.

“Sounds good,” Tanuma agreed as he joined in with the snow sculpting, “What about the snowballs? How many of those do we need?”

“True. Honestly, I don’t know.” Natsume thought out loud, “I think its ok if at the beginning, we have less snowballs and focus on the fort. Because we if we run out, our fort at least would provide us another protection to build more”

“That’s a good point,” Tanuma said before he chuckled, “You said you’ve never done this before. But you already sound like an expert”

“I’m not so sure. I don’t know how well this plan will work”

“Hey! You guys have about half an hour before we start,” Nishimura called out from their end, “So stop screwing around and get to building”

Heeding his advice, both sides got to building their forts and snowballs. Each team had their own strategies in mind, and time was also filled with casual conversation. Roughly thirty minutes passed by (Nishimura ended up asking for an extra 30 minutes) and both teams were ready for battle.

As planned, Tanuma and Natsume had built a tall and wide rectangular fort around the tree. They had also had a few dozen snowballs on them. 

Meanwhile, Kitamoto and Nishimura had a tall but skinny wall in front of them. However, their snowball pile was massive, and seemed to cover as a back wall all on its own. 

“Alright, here are the rules,” Kitamoto explained, “Each person can only be hit 3 times before they are out. To win, you have to knock out all the opposite team’s members while having at least one member on your team still alive.”

“We’ll start in 3. 2. 1. Go!”

And with that, the battle began. It started off with a flurry of snowballs from Nishimura and Kitamoto. Tanuma and Natsume had stay under the covers for the first couple of minutes. Once things slowed down a bit, this gave some openings for Natsume and Tanuma to throw some snowballs themselves.

“Haha! Where you aiming at?” Nishimura laughed as he threw a snowball, “I know you guys are new. But I didn’t expect you guys to be so bad at throwing!”

What Nishimura and Kitamoto didn’t realize was that those “misses” from Natsume and Tanuma had slowly been breaking away at their fort. 

Still, their small snowball pile eventually caught up to them and they were running low on supply. Tanuma had been hit twice while Natsume had been hit once. Meanwhile, Kitamoto had only been hit once.

“You go restock on our snowballs. I’ll handle these two,” Tanuma suggested while still keeping his focus on the other two, “If we can build enough, I can distract them and you can sneak out the back and head towards that open side of theirs. Then, when you’re ready, we can do a surprise attack and ambush them on both sides”

“Sounds like a solid plan.”

After a head nod from Tanuma, Natsume crawled to one side of the fort, heading towards the area with the most coverage. He stayed as low as possible, dodging the incoming snowballs until he felt it was safe.

He then started patting the snow and forming a snowball. He was surprised how quickly it was becoming second nature to him. However, as he went through the motions in the closed space, the sight of the ever-patted snowball soon began to remind him of a distant memory.

_  
A snowball whizzed by a small child, startling him out of his thoughts. While the snowball did not hit the boy directly, chips from the snowball’s splatter had trickled down his clothes and onto the boy's exposed skin. He shivered._

_The boy looked back to the source of the snowball. A few of the older kids were standing several feet behind him, wearing proud smirks._

_"There was a monster behind you. So, we killed it for you," explained a tall boy who stood in the middle. He seemed to be the leader of the group. A signalled chorus of snickers came from the rest of the trio. "That's what you say is following you, right?"_

_The young boy frowned but said nothing. He turned away and continued to walk forward. Two more snowballs came; one missing while the other hitting his new backpack._

_‘Oba-san will get mad again,’ the boy thought, remembering the couple who took the boy in. She had complained when her husband bought a replacement for his old, tattered one. Turning his walk to a dash, he tried to escape his attackers. He heard an additional set of running footsteps, soon followed by a bunch of snowballs. While a stray few hit the back of his head, he continued on running. He ignored his surroundings until he heard something peculiar._

_**"I... Hunger,"** a raspy voice spoke in tone that evenly matched his words. His heartbeat quickening, the boy closed his eyes and dashed even faster. However, he opened eyes after he heard a rustle from the bushes ahead._

_**"LET ME EAT YOU, BOY!" **a pitch-black shadow fiercely yelled. The boy turned to match the youkai's gaze, eerie white eyes boring into his startled ones.****_

_Terrified, the boy tripped and fell backwards. He screamed as he saw the monster's white piercing teeth opening wide as the distance between it and him shortened dramatically._

_Expecting his impending end, he crossed his hands above him and shut his eyes tight. He heard a set of splats before falling on his bottom. He opened his eyes upon his unexpected landing._

_He saw startled expressions from the group of boys that were following him. It was not at him, but what was beside him. He followed their gaze, leading him to the monster that was chasing him. It was hissing in pain, evident from the blotch of splattered snow on him._

_Using this as his chance, he got up and ran. Ran as fast as he could. He felt so tired, his cold wet clothes effectively draining the energy from him. But he didn't care. He ran far away from here, ignoring the youkai in pain and the stunned looks from the boys behind. Ran desperately in the general direction of his home._

_It's so cold. So cold..._

_He didn't know how long he ran. But after some time, he saw the house not so far ahead._

_It's so cold. Why is winter...so cold? Why is everyone...so cold?_

_He weakly walked a few steps before stumbling down. The face rested on the first step towards the door, his wet clothes numbing the pain he felt from his trip. Ahead of him was a pile of snow on the door step. It’s mesmerizing shimmer alluring him to lose consciousness._

He had once hated winter. Maybe admired the frozen beauty in creates, but hated coldness it brings. He couldn’t see what good it could ever bring. Never did he imagine that years later, he would be enjoying a snow fight with his friends.

"Natsume!" he heard Tanuma call out. He was able to notice the snowball coming out of an unusual location. He tried to dodge it, but it still managed to land on his shoulder. 

Everyone looked towards the direction of the thrown snowball, including Nishimura and Kitamoto. Several metres adjacent to them, was Taki and Sasada with a fort of their own.

"Man, when the heck did you guys get there?" Nishimura asked with a befuddled expression.

"Anything can happen, right?" Sasada teased while Taki nodded in agreement. While one of Taki’s hands carried a snowball, the other arm rested closely to her chest. Hugging tightly to it was a slouched, half-dead looking familiar cat.

"Nyanko-sensei?" Natsume asked dumbfoundedly, suppressing his snickers at Nyanko-sensei's sorry state.

"Hey, look! They have a hostage!" Tanuma pointed out.

"Don't worry, fat cat! Ill save you!" Nishmura declared and aimed a snowball right at Sasada.

Sasada ducked, which led the snowball hitting flat right onto Taki's face.

"T-Taki?!" Nishimura gasped, embarrassment turning his face red.

"Thank you, Taki." Sasada thanked the girl before throwing a snowball at the distracted Nishimura.

"Oooof!" Nishimura grunted before falling down back down onto the snow. Kitamoto laughed at his fallen partner before getting hit by a snowball as well.

"Don't forget about us!" Tanuma reminded as Natsume gave him all the snowballs he built. Sasada managed to dodge again but Taki was still immobile from the snow on her face. Unable to dodge, the snowball landed instead right on Nyanko-sensei's face.

"Uh oh," Tanuma said. Sensing an awoken and angered little kitty, Taki quickly turned around away from everyone.

_"You little brats!"_ Nyanko-sensei yelled before transforming. However, the puff of smoke and his loud, bellowing voice shook the several nearby trees.

A huge pile of snow fell onto the ground, burying everyone. After several seconds or so, with a softened rumble, a couple of heads popped out.

"Is everyone alright?" Taki asked.

"I'm fine." Tanuma replied.

"Me too." Natsume added in.

"What the heck was that?" Sasada shouted, looking back and forth at Natsume and Taki.

"Umm, I was practising my voice acting," Natsume said nervously, hiding behind him a knocked-out cat.

Sasada observed Natsume, who tried to give his best, genuine expression. 

Seeing Natsume in trouble, Tanuma looked around and asked, "Where is Kitamoto and Nishimura?" 

They decided to give them a minute for the duo to pop up, especially since it wasn’t that much snow to sift through. However, as the minute was drawing to an end, everyone began to get nervous.

Sasada then soon recalled, "Ah, weren't they knocked down earlier by a couple of our snowballs? They fell into the snow and...."

Their faces went pale before they frantically searched for the two, digging through the snow pile.

After not much searching, they found the two asleep on opposite ends. While it didn't take too much to wake up Kitamoto, Nishimura was out like a light.

"Geez, what a kid." Sasada sighed, watching Natsume and Kitamoto help carry up their friend. 

“So, what should we do now?” Taki asked.

"If you want, we can head to my house and warm up. My place isn’t too far from here,” Tanuma suggested.

They all agreed to the plan and headed towards Tanuma’s house. They each took turns carrying Nishimura, who had been sleep-talking the entire way. Luckily, the path wasn’t too rough and after a short hike, they reached a familiar, Japanese style home. 

After they cleaned themselves up so they wouldn’t drag in any snow, Tanuma led them to one of the rooms. It had a kotatsu* in the centre and a view of the back porch on the other end. They all began to settled around the kotatsu while Tanuma stepped out to bring some food.

“Ahhhhh, this feels so nice,” Taki said cheerfully, plopping her legs under the table.

“It does feel good after playing in the snow for so long,” Kitamoto agreed.

“Ughh...” Nishimura moaned, slowly stirring from his sleep. Everyone watched as he slowly rose his head off the kotatsu. “Where are we? What happened?” he asked groggily.

“You got knocked out by snowballs and then got buried in more snow,” Sasada explained as a-matter-of-factly.

“Awww, damn it!” Nishimura complained before his face lift up after remembering something, “We won at least though, right? Right?”

“We had to stop the snow fight. The sudden snowfall that buried you guys also destroyed everyone’s forts and snowballs,” Sasada said before taking a glance of Natsume.

“Though considering we were the only ones that got knocked out by the snow, I would say we lost,”  
Kitamoto admitted with a defeated sigh, “We lost at our own game.” 

“Don’t feel bad, Kitamoto. It was still a lot fun.” Tanuma said as he stepped in from one of the inner rooms. He was carrying a tray of hot tea and snacks. He placed them on the centre of the table. “I wouldn’t mind doing it another time”

“Yeah, me too. And I learned a lot thanks to you,” Natsume agreed.

Taken in by the compliments, Nishimura straightened his back and looked proud. “Hehe. Yeah, and we were definitely going easy on you”

"Guys, look outside!" Sasada exclaimed.

Turning to her direction, everyone headed towards the porch to see her the cause of her excitement.

"Wow, it's so pretty." Taki commented.

Outside the porch, tiny iridescent sparkles had been slowly falling from the sky. It shimmered in the sunlight, like a translucent wave flowing in one direction.

"But what is it?" Nishimura wondered.

"Diamond dust, I think" Kitamoto answered, “They’re tiny frozen ice crystals in the air being reflected by the sun"

The group decided to sit closer to the porch and watch. Tanuma brought the tea and snacks closer and conversation resume once more. 

“This is the first time I’ve ever seeing them,” Tanuma said.

“Me too. Its a nice day to end the day” Taki agreed.

“I’ve only seen them once.” Kitamoto commented, “Its very rare for it to happen.”

As the group continued to watch in amazement, Natsume couldn’t help but smiled warmly. “I guess anything can happen.”

**Author's Note:**

> *kotatsu is a table with a blanket attached to it and a heater under the table. Often found in homes in Japan during the winter.
> 
> I know this was suppose to be light-hearted but I couldn't help dabble into Natsume's past a bit. Thank you to @sabaruki41 on Twitter for proof-reading my work.
> 
> This is a part 1 of the gift @metal-dragons on Tumblr and have a part 2 that I plan to have finish next week (it won't be related to this fic but will be using the other prompts you suggested). I'm really sorry how long it took to post this. I hope you enjoyed it this fanfic as I had a lot of fun writing it.
> 
> Happy Holidays.


End file.
